Poppy Widdison collapsed at her home in Grimsby in June 2013 and died later in hospital after suffering a cardiac arrest.

Humberside Police
Poppy Widdison died after being fed a cocktail of drugs by her mother and former partner.

A judge described how Pyke fed her daughter sedatives because she was an “inconvenience” to her “squalid passion” with Rytting.

Judge Jeremy Richardson QC told Pyke she was “utterly unfit to be a mother” and said to the pair: “You both bear huge responsibility for blighting the life of a pretty, vivacious little girl,” the Press Association reports.

The judge described how Poppy was born a heroin addict and existed in a “swamp of drug addiction”, and how her mother had a “deplorable attitude” towards an “innocent infant”.

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James Widdison, Poppy’s uncle, said he did not think the family or social services could have foreseen what happened.

Speaking outside the court he said: “We’ve waited three and a half years for this day and it doesn’t get any easier.

“The memories we’ve got of her are everlasting. We won’t ever be distanced from that. There’s no such thing as closure with regards to this case,” ITV reports.